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Worlds Without End Blog

Curiosity Advances Science Fact, Tomorrow Posted at 11:27 PM by Rico Simpkins

icowrich

If, like us, you plan to stay up bleary-eyed, watching Curiosity land and deploy on the surface of Mars, you may want to catch up on what it is you’ll be watching for.

We’ve all probably read about the seven minutes of terror, during which the rover will be perilously hurtling toward the planet surface, hopefully decelerating to a gentle landing.  When those seven minutes are over, we should be getting information from several sources. MSNBC describes the three different ways Curiosity will communicate with Earth:

Controllers on Earth will have three ways of hailing Curiosity as it trundles around Gale Crater. Two are direct links through NASA’s Deep Space Network, a worldwide collection of antennas. It provides both a fixed low-gain antenna, best for basic commands and emergencies, and a pointable high-gain antenna for complex commands.

Curiosity also has a higher-speed ultra-high frequency (UHF) communications system that can send signals to spacecraft orbiting Mars, which in turn would relay them to Earth.

To send back imagery, Curiosity must stay in touch with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Odyssey spacecraft, two probes orbiting Mars that each can talk to the rover twice a day. (Odyssey is currently recovering from the loss of one of its three reaction wheels.)

Business Insider scored a geektastic inventory of Curiosity’s space-age toolset:

For two of these special instruments, NASA turned to Honeybee Robotics, a development firm headquartered in Manhattan. Building on previous work for the Spirit and Opportunity rovers, Honeybee developed the Sample Manipulation System (SMS) and the Dust Removal Tool (DRT). These tools are critical to investigating Mars’ ability to sustain life — in the past and present.  

Natalie Wolchover, of the The Christian Science Monitor, wonders whether we might be visiting distant relatives:

If life exists on Mars, then we might be ethnic Martians ourselves, scientists told Life’s Little Mysteries. They explained that the small coincidence of having two life-bearing planets right next door to one another gets cleared up if one of the planets actually seeded life on the other — a concept called “panspermia.” According to Pavlov, hundreds of thousands of Martian meteorites are strewn across Earth. These were hurled into space during past planetary collisions (such as the bash that left Mars with a crater covering nearly half its surface). One of these chunks of Mars could feasibly have contained spores that lay dormant during the interplanetary commute to Earth, and then blossomed upon arrival, some 3.8 billion years ago.

The main event should happen around 12:31 p.m. Central Standard Time. The NASA webcast starts at 8:30 p.m. PDT on NASA TV.  If you want to be twitter friends with the rover (who wouldn’t!) follow @MarsCuriosity on Twitter (while there, follow us, @WWEnd).

Space Shuttle Discovery Launch! Posted at 9:29 AM by Dave Post

Dave Post

Amazing video footage taken from an airplane.  I’m in awe and feelin’ a bit sad that there are so few shuttle launches left.  Back to capsules atop rockets?  Really?

NASA Dreams of a Hundred-Year Starship Posted at 10:47 AM by Dave Post

Dave Post

The StarlostI recently read an article about a joint NASA/DARPA project called the "Hundred-Year Starship".  Basically, it’s a year-long study to determine the feasibility of constructing a generation ship for the purpose of colonizing a suitable planet outside our solar system.  According to Paul Eremenko, project coordinator at DARPA:

"The 100 Year Starship study is about more than building a spacecraft or any one specific technology.  We endeavor to excite several generations to commit to the research and development of breakthrough technologies and cross-cutting innovations across a myriad of disciplines to advance the goal of long-distance space travel, but also to benefit mankind."

Could NASA pull off anything as awesome as all that? Even with DARPA’s help?  Well, let’s just say I’m with Capt. Xerox on this one.  He sums it up nicely for me:

"I wouldn’t go betting any money on this program actually happening. NASA hasn’t been back to the moon in a generation, never mind heading beyond the solar system…"

Bottom line?  Not bloody likely.  So says my rational mind anyway.

My geeky SF brain, however, refuses to let go of the notion.  I’ve been reading about generation ships and extra-solar colonization forever.  The technological wonder of a massive starship with a complete enclosed ecosystem hurtling through space for a hundred years, taking its precious cargo of humanity across the void in search of another Eden?  Entire generations of inhabitants living aboard a ship that is the only home they’ve ever known?  Never to see the Earth again?  That’s the stuff of dreams.

And of course astronomers have been finding new planets at an astonishing pace.  How long before they find one worth visiting?  Will we be ready to go when they do?  How far out would we have to start planning something like that to ever make it a reality?  I’d say pretty damn far.  So far, in fact, that it sounds like science fiction.  Kind of like now.  I can’t tell you how excited I am just knowing that there are real scientists out there actually considering this idea; especially at a time when it seems that we’re moving further and further away from the promise of manned space flight.

I say keep on dreaming big, NASA!  It has to start somewhere, sometime.  And even though it likely won’t happen in our lifetimes there are plenty of us out here who will go right along dreaming with you.


Would you like to know more?

Generation Ship Novels
Until there’s a real ship to take us "where no man has gone before" we’ll have to make do with some great science fictional accounts of what it might be like:

Learning the World Ship of Fools Non-Stop Brute Orbits Cities in Flight Nightside the Long Sun Eon Heart of the Comet Ring Rendezvous with Rama

What other great generation ship novels can you think of?

Real “Worlds Without End” Posted at 12:24 AM by Dave Post

Dave Post

Earth-like planetSpace.com is reporting that the 500th alien planet could be discovered this month.  There are currently 494 confirmed extrasolar planets on the books and, at the rate they’re being discovered, it is expected that number will top 500 by the close of October.

What’s more, with new technologies like NASA’s Kepler spacecraft the rate of discovery is only going to go up.  Kepler has already found 7 new planets and has identified over 700 candidate stars that may have planets.

"Researchers are following up on these promising leads, trying to rule out any false alarms. They’re checking out the candidates with ground-based instruments as well as orbiting assets like the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope.

When such work is done, the number of known alien worlds could increase by several hundred — and it could happen soon."

Worlds Without End, indeed!